The Irony in the Results
by Dr. SecretAgentMan
Summary: 'It's a funny thing,' He realizes, as he sits on the border between laughing and crying, the sounds out of his mouth so jumbled up they are indescribable. 'That this will be what will bring me down. So ironic.' Sweets gets some life-changing news. Post Season 7. This will probably be a three-shot (does that even exist?). Sweets-centric, but the whole team will be included.
1. Chapter 1

Warning: I have _absolutely _no medical experience/this story is based in no medical truth whatsoever. I did no research….Please don't kill me. Oh, and it's only rated T because I'm _super_ conscious.

Disclaimer: I do not own Bones (the tv show, book, or any characters herein.)

Lance laughs when he gets the results. He just stares at the paper and laughs and laughs and laughs and laughs. His voice echoes throughout the apartment, a voice chock full of desperation and a disturbing amount of irony that's just laughing, and laughing and laughing. And suddenly, his laughs are cries, deep, heart-wrenching cries that gurgle up from somewhere deep inside him, somewhere small and quiet and so, so, very dark. 'It's a funny thing,' He realizes, as he sits on the border between laughing and crying, the sounds out of his mouth so jumbled up they are indescribable. 'That this will be what will bring me down. So ironic.' His head is forced into his knees by his own power, as he trembles there and wallows, the papers in his hands crumpling, forming a mountain of folds that barrel into each other, trapping the words in a canyon of his own making. But that canyon, while great and wide, cannot hold the truth forever, and slowly, but surely, the reality slinks out, the words wrapping around him, their whispers harsh in his ears. He falls asleep to them, the sounds barreling around in his mind. 'Malignant….. Brain tumor….Memory Loss….Cancer.' And somehow, he doesn't get much rest that night.

The next day comes and goes without change, so does the next week, and then the next month. He doesn't tell anyone, doesn't want Angela's pity, or Brennan's prodding, or Booth's veiled concern. Everything is kept hidden, a box of monsters under his bed, but he knows he cannot evade them for long. The people he works with are some of the smartest he's ever known; they are scientists, made to analyze and deduce and push and push and push, until the answers they seek fall out in nice even rows at their feet. Even Booth is exceptionally observant, a mix of protective instincts and planned execution that will not fail to notice the inconsistencies in his movement. There is nothing that will escape them, not all of them, but it does not stop Lance from trying. He will not be a burden to them now, not when they've finally begun to trust him, rely on him, actually listen to his logic. So when the pain comes, he grits his teeth, and when the nausea hits, dinner is politely refused. And then the memory loss strikes, and he finds there's no way he can hide that one.

He's in his office the first time it happens. The patient is an agent with dingy yellow teeth and a two day old beard, a mix of stress and PTSD and so many other things that Lance is having trouble keeping up with each story, much less what disorder is being described in each. Each babbling string of syllables brings the slight pittering in Lance's head up a level, so that it now lay at a slow flat drone that eliminated all attempts of understanding. It's a wonder that he's able to hold his head up at all, when all he really wants to do is curl up in a ball and sleep until the pain disappears or abates or does anything other than what it's doing now. There's nothing he can do about it though, and he thoroughly dismisses his patients, 'I have to go-now. Go _now_.'s with his own exasperated, 'It's not time to go yet, you have to stay the whole time.'s. The whole process is enough to put his whole body in agony, and when Booth and Brennan burst through the door, the profile of yet another serial killer dangling in their arms, he's all too ready to leave. He dismisses his patient with a wave of the hand, and graciously follows them out. It's not until they're out in the parking lot, loading into Booth's car when he realizes it. "I'm surprised you haven't been called us out on being late for our session, Dr. Sweets." "You weren't la-" He glanced at the clock, where six-thirty stood out like a spotlight. Oh. _Oh_. It had been time to go. He doesn't even bother to advise against the concerned glances that are sent his way.

After that, the loss happens more than often. There is nothing he can do about it, but the flashes still manage to hamper him. Not a day will go by without him misplacing his folder, only to find it on the counter where he'd lain it just seconds earlier, or walk into a room with Booth, only to forget what he was doing or who he had to profile. The concerned looks were becoming more frequent. On more than one occasion, Hodgins had pulled him aside; worry donning his usually carefree features, begging him to come to someone, anyone, tell them what was wrong. 'At least Booth. You need to tell Booth.' All Lance had done was smile, and brush off his concern with a trained tongue. He'd staggered away afterwards, feet barely steady enough to keep him upright. Hodgins flanked him the whole way back, worriedly placing a hand on his back when he could see the younger man teetering. From that point on, Lance made an effort to send blinding smiles to the entomologist whenever he could. The scientist totally wasn't buying it.

In all honesty, Lance could tell that none of the team was really buying into his 'perfectly fine-why would you think anything was wrong' act. Angela had repeatedly commented on his eating habits, and made it her job to try and coax food into his stomach, after she noticed the sheer amount of weight he's lost. He'd obliged; he could ever deny Angela. It always ended the same though, with knees bruised after contact with the bathroom floor, gagging and retching until all that came out were dry heaves and the pitiful moans that sometimes escaped his lips when he thought there was no one around. He let Cam play doctor, telling her it was the flu, and watching her poke and prod even when he knew she knew that wasn't it. She'd been gentle, brushing hair away from his forehead when she leaned in to check his temperature, and squeezing his hand in reassurance when she counted his pulse. Her whole demeanor screamed 'I know you're hiding something from me. Trust me with it. I can take care of you.' Lance left her with a gentle smile and a quick hug that she actually accepted. He hadn't said a word.

Brennan's worry was the one that Lance hadn't been prepared for. He fully expected her to study him or sick Booth on him or at the very least, compartmentalize herself into not caring. There was not much he expecting in terms of concern from the usually stoic anthropologist, so it was a great surprise to him when she corned him just before he escaped the lab, hand gripping his tightly as she dragged him into her office. He was halfway through squirming away, eyes roaming for an escape route, when Brennan turned towards him with such force, he almost fell over. 'Do you not care about us anymore? Are Booth and I not your friends?' Lance froze at the words, and then realizing what that might look like immediately raced to refute the statement. His words jumbled together in hopes that he would get them out faster, but Brennan seemed to get the gist in whatever nonsense came spewing out of his mouth. However, the effect Lance desired was not by any means achieved. Instead she looked almost distraught, and the unexpectedness of the whole meeting continued when out of nowhere, her arms were around him, pulling him into the acception he'd needed for so long.

They stood like that for a long while. She was the only thing holding him up at that point, and when she finally spoke, her voice echoed out of the stillness of the room straight into his ear. 'I may disagree with your choice of profession, Dr. Sweets, but I've found that I cannot base my judgment of you solely from that. Booth and I are both…defective when it comes to you, and when you are in danger, I find it hard to think about anything but your safety. From what I've seen, you feel the same way about us, so I cannot fathom why you will not tell us what is wrong.' She brushed a stray hair away from his face. 'You once told me to rely on my friends to help me; now you must do the same. Let us help you Sweets.' She paused. 'Please.' And he broke down in her arms.

He ended up staying at the Booth's that night. Not a word, or at least a recognizable one, had left his lips since he had broken the hug, trailing behind Brennan like a poor, kicked puppy when she left the Jeffersonian. They'd climbed in her car, and drove off-he didn't even give himself a second to think about it. The next thing he knew, Booth was opening the door with an odd look on his face, one that was not surprise or irritation or anger or anything else Booth was known for. Sure there was concern in there, but it was mixed with something Lance couldn't quite pin down, even as he's being ushered in, Booth's hand steady on his shoulder. He says something about Christine being with Max, and another thing about the state of their house, but Lance can't bring himself to do anything but lean into Booth's hand, letting the voices of the partners wash over him, soothing him into the first easy sleep he's had in months. He doesn't even make it to the guest room. His legs give out about halfway between the kitchen and the living room, and Booth has to carry him, bridal style to the couch, which should be easy enough as at the moment he probably weighs less than Brennan does. There's no missing the gentle way Booth lays him down, or the tenderness with which uses to card his fingers through the psychologist's hair. Lance doesn't even resist the urge to nestle his face into Booth's hand, letting the fatherly touch sooth him into the recesses of his mind. For the moment, he is happy, something he hasn't been in a long, long, long time.

He doesn't remember the seizure. One minute he's falling asleep, and the next he's waking up to a face that's so Booth, with brown eyes dark with worry and crinkled in concern. Strong hands are cradling his head, which is pounding and aching and _pounding_ in a way Lance is sure it isn't supposed to do. It takes a second for him to realize the hands are Booth's, another for him to realize that the agent is saying something. The words are coming to him slowly and quietly, like echoes in the distance, and it takes all of his concentration to decipher them. 'Sweets.' Booth mouths and Lance wants to answer, he really does, but his tongue is like lead, and refuses to unhinge from the roof of his mouth. When he's finally able to move it, the words come out so horribly mangled, that Booth nearly goes frantic with worry. He shouts something to Brennan, who Lance has not noticed till now. He can hear her yelling at someone over the phone, but the distance between him and the voices is growing greater by the second, and the last thing he sees before he slips into the darkness are two pairs of worried eyes staring down at him, blue and brown mixing to create an awful swirl of light that follows him down and down and down into the abyss.

"Clear!"


	2. Chapter 2

**Warning**: I have _absolutely _no medical experience/this story is based in no medical truth whatsoever. I did no research….Please don't kill me. Oh, and it's only rated T because I'm _super_ conscious.

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Bones (the tv show, book, or any characters herein.)

Lance wakes to an ache in his chest, and a stinging in his arm, and pressure on his face. It's so disorienting that for a moment, he starts to thrash, all thoughts on getting away from whatever it is that's causing him so much pain. Strong hands hold him down, and loud sounds assault his ears, his world a mix of whirling and beeping and buzzing that has his mind spinning in more directions than one. His resistance gets stronger, but his thin, flailing limbs do little to subdue his enemy. Everything is screaming now, but all attempts at getting away are halted when he hears them. Their voices are like a lighthouse in his clouded mind, voices he knows and trusts with his life. Calm and consoling 'It's fine, you're ok, you're fine,' breaks through the pounding noise, and he feels his body relax. They are here, protecting him, taking care of him; nothing can happen to him here. The pain in his arm abates then, an odd numbing feeling that travels from the once throbbing vein to the rest of his body, whisking him away from the conscious world. Somehow, he can still feel the hands grasping his, and he falls asleep knowing they are there. He has never felt more safe.

They all react differently to the truth. He blatantly tells Brennan, knows she's already used her status to gain access to just about everything- it probably also helps that sometime in the haze of the last few months, he made her and Booth his emergency contacts, along with a few other things. She tells him he's an idiot in all too many words, but he notices she hasn't gone home since the incident. He doesn't need to drag up his psychologist mindset to know what that means. During Booth's explanation, he apologizes at least six times, and pretends not to notice how the man's punch turns into one armed hug halfway though. He figures they're even when Booth doesn't mention how by the end, he's curled into the embrace, too tired to break free. Angela breaks into tears in the middle of hers, Hodgins' arm protectively draped around her side. She kisses his shrink's check when she's done; her husband stood beside her, making the worst joke Lance has ever heard, hand squeezing the space between the psychologist's shoulder and neck. He laughs because he knows the last time they stood like this, it ended with one of their best friends rotting away in an institution, and the fact that they're here, not hiding away avoiding their pain, is a show of how much they care for him. Cam scolds him when she learns the truth, scolds and scolds and scolds until he's sure her tongue will fall off, but the way she's looking at him, like he's not a full grown man but her twenty year old daughter, makes him take every word of it to heart.

He finally agrees to chemo, something he's been avoiding since the beginning. The worry that the team will leave him once he has proved totally and utterly useless has abated into almost nothing. There's always one of them with him at all times, usually two, but only if their schedule allows. They still have a job to do, and Lance respects that, but he can't help missing them when they're gone. His hair has started falling out. Long sweeps of midnight locks ordinate his pillow, a new gift for every time he wakes up. It's not necessarily the worst thing that's happened to him, but when small bald spots give way to blinding patches of pale skin, he can't help but grasp at them, like they are pieces of his life fading away. Angela walks in during one of those sessions, when he's grasping and grasping and grasping at straws of his old life, hands trembling as he holds the strands to his face. She lets him bury his fears in her shoulder, reminds him that it's only hair, 'Sweetie, it's only hair. There's so much worse we-you could lose,' and then breaks into tears herself, apologizing for reminding them of the obvious, kissing his forehead over and over again with a tenderness that is so Angela, it makes memories of long ago come flying back. He misses that time so, so very much. Maybe that's why, when Hodgins walks in the next day baring beanies of every single color, sports team, and children's cartoon he can imagine, he sits with the man for far longer than he has in a while, talking and laughing and comparing every single girl who walks by to Angela, finally deciding that no woman compares to Angela just as the artist herself walks in. And while Lance is pretty sure Hodgins said it just to save his skin, he finds he can't find fault in a word the entomologist is saying. Not a word.

When the hospital finally releases him, it's not to his own home. The Booth's practically drag him to their house, and while it's a blow to his pride when he has to use the wheelchair to get there, he can't help the smile that stretches across his face when Christine bolts into his lap, small arms outstretched, complementing his 'totally-awesome-Uncle-Lance-can-I-drive-it' ride. Somehow, the little girl can always make his day, even if hours before he was retching pitifully into a bedpan, Christine's own parents rubbing reassuring circles on his back with assurance he was sure they didn't have. Lance spends the next hour or so wheeling the three-year-old around the living room, both wearing so many beanies they could barely keep their heads up. He's practically panting by the time it's over, but he notices the look of disappointment in his niece's eyes, and is seconds away from making up for it, when the girl goes running off, without so much as a look in his direction. Empty, empty, empty, empty fills him, crashing down around him in a symphony of grief, that not even Booth, Brennan, or their combined looks of concern can fix. He just sits there, head in his hands, dumbstruck, trying to form words around the ache building in his chest. Then suddenly, it's no longer an ache, but blinding, beating, blaring love as a small, stuffed, pink and blue duckling is shoved in his face, the same duckling he'd gotten Christine the day she was born, the only thing that could get her to go to sleep half the time. He blinks once, then twice, before being cut off by the toddler sitting in his lap, looking at him with a smile plastered over her tiny face. 'This is Donnie.' She says, as if he hasn't known the toy from all the times he's sat with her, or played with her, or carried her off to bed. 'He's mine, but I'm a-lenting him to you. Donnie's gonna make you better, so me, and Mommy, and Daddy and you can play together. Ok.' The duck is dropped into his lap then, and the youngest Booth runs off before he can say a word. It doesn't leave his hands the rest of the night.

Food isn't his enemy anymore, or, at least, not as much as it used to be. He can keep some of it down, and the feeling like his stomach's a spinning, swirling mass of pain has died down somewhat, leaving him able to eat every once in a while, even if it is only toast or soup or some other tasteless mass that he has to shove down his throat along with just about every size, shape, and color of pill imaginable. The team has helped, of course, and whenever they visit, there's always something new and appetizing and light enough to keep down sitting on the counter, waiting for him. Portions are small, bearable, and Lance is pretty sure he can thank Cam for that. After the last incident, when the pathologist had found him, pale and shaking over the Booths' toilet, tears slipping unwarranted from his eyes as he tried and tried and ultimately _failed_ to control his heaving, she had declared herself THE doctor. He still remembered her hands, feather light against his back, rubbing circles with the upmost care, her voice soothing to his tired body. Even when all the substance was purged from his system, and Lance found himself slumping bonelessly against Cam's side, taking small panting breaths, she had handed him a glass of water, 'that's it; just take small sips,' becoming her mantra. He didn't know how he'd ended up on the couch afterwards, didn't ask in an effort to retain at least some of his dignity. He had just smiled and nodded his thanks to her the next time she stopped by, and hoped she got the message. It was too tiring to do much else.

Brennan wasn't there. He guessed he could chop that up to reasons why it happened the way it did. She had only gone shopping, something that took half an hour at most, but all hell had broken loose in those few minutes she was gone. Booth had been making them lunch then, and Lance wanted to help. He really did, but his legs refused to cooperate, and soon his eyes did too, to the point where he had to force them open as he listened to Booth fill the kitchen with a collection of sizzles and pops. Each little noise, from the sound of the spatula scraping the skillet to the resulting hiss of the agent pouring oil on the hot pan, had the opposite effect of what it should have, and he found his eyes drifting shut. His head drooped, as all thoughts of helping left him, replaced with the overwhelming need for sleep, nice, dreamless, relaxing sleep. Sure, he heard the sounds in the kitchen fizzle to a stop, and the slight padding of feet close in around him, but it wasn't until Booth was nearly upon him, lunch piled lightly on a bowl in his hand, that he noticed him. His eyes flew open and suddenly, unexpectedly, Booth's hand was no longer Booth's. His father staring down at him, his real, biological, should-be-dead, father. And Lance scuttled as far away from the figure as possible.

A half-gasp of fear escaped him as he fit the back cushions of the coach, and finding nowhere to go, he just sat there, cowering, arms over his head, as he begged Him, pleaded with Him, apologized for whatever fault he had unknowingly committed. 'I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Please don't. I didn't mean to,' escaped his lips in a desperate plea that had never worked on Him before. Yet somehow, it was working now, and the man just stood there, frozen in shock, a plate of stir-fly lying prone in his hands. 'It's not real. It's Booth. Just Booth,' his brain supplied, the part that wasn't fogged with sleep or drugs or a god-freaking tumor, but Lance ignored it, the rapid thumping of his heart taking all precedence right now. His instincts said to run, _demanded_ he run, but for some reason he couldn't. His breath coming in panicky gasps, he just stared at his 'father' who was beginning to look less and less like that man, and more like the agent he had come to know as a brother, and more recently, hopefully, like a father- a good, actually-decent, father. As his brain slowly receded from its clouded state, every part of his body relaxed, panic contracting and folding into itself until all that remained was a trembling pinprick of fear, one that was disappearing by the second. 'Booth.' He forced out, before crumpling into the agent's arms, a blubbering mess of 'I'm sorry. You're not him. You'd never be like him,' that hung around the stillness of the room. A hand, calloused from years of hard work, came up to grasp the back of his head, fingers running though what would have been his hair so long ago. 'You know I'd never hurt you, right? No matter what I say, I'd never lay a hand on you. Never.' Booth mummers, and Lance nods furiously to the agent's chest. 'I know. I know.' Tears leak onto the Federal grade whites. 'I know.'


	3. Chapter 3

**Warning**: I have _absolutely _no medical experience/this story is based in no medical truth whatsoever. I did no research….Please don't kill me. Oh, and it's only rated T because I'm _super_ conscious.

**Warning (2x)**: Sweets shall be doubly whumped here! Cuz I'm just amazing like that. Oh, and this chapter-thingy is _way_ shorter than the others. Sorry!

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Bones (the tv show, book, or any characters herein.)

Lance remembers the second time. They're having dinner, not him, Brennan, and Booth, but _all _of them, the table a florish of conspirist theories and jargon and laughing, laughing, laughing, and he's just sitting there with a grin that could split his face in two. Sandwitched inbetween Brennan and the couch, joking about Booth's bedhead and –_Hodgins you dog_- You bought her that?, he couldn't be more happy. And then suddenly he was a flailing mass of limbs with no room for joy whatsoever.

His glass hits the table with was should have been a crash, but they've planned for this, and the plastic bounces easily off the mohogany. Brennan is rushing for him, an attempt to restrain his shaking, seizing body, but he's too unstable, too fast, and before he can even think to warn her, his arm, in the mist of a throw, cracks down on something. Hard. It takes a second, a terrible, trembling second for him to realize it, a second that Brennan takes to stradle him, knees on the floor locking his chest in place, hands forcing his down, someone else's hands pillowing his head. He doesn't notice it though, doesn't think about anything but the horror before him, and when the seizure finally releases its hold, he can do nothing but stare at the bruise already starting to form on Brennan's cheek, made livid by the trail of blood that was currently trickling down her lip. _Oh god_-he hit Brennan. He_ hit _Brennan.

It was about then she realized it too, but she held fast, restraining his futile attempts to squirm away, hands latched around his wrists like they were lifelines. His breath came in, faster, faster, panicy little gasps until he was practically wheezing for air, the sounds stabbing at the soundlessness, dashing it to bits and then throwing it off the side as if it were a scrap to be discarded. Still, she didn't relent, all strong and commanding and Brennan-like, logicly pointing out that he should calm down, _Sweets, Sweets! Stop panicing; it's over. _He let out a feral little noise at that, because it wasn't over-_I hit you__**. I hit you**__. Get away! __**Please**__, before it happens again,_fogging up his thoughts and clouding his mind. Brennan ignores it though, choosing instead to press her forehead up against his, her cool breaths a relief against the radiating heat. 'Sweets.' She mumbles, so concerned and motherly that he lets out a sob of anguish. _Hate me; hate me. I hurt you. _'You're hyperventilating. You need to take slower breaths, or you'll go into syncope.' _I hurt you. I hurt you. I hurt you. _His breaths speed up more.

Carefully, she released one wrist, before taking it again and pressing it just under her collar bone, inbetween her breasts. 'Copy my breathing.' She demands, her voice all coming in clear over all else. When he didn't do so immediately, she tightened her grip and commanded it again in a voice he couldn't refuse. He just took deep breaths in sync with the person he hurt, who he loved like a mother and a sister and a mentor and a few other things combined, listening to her go against every logical bone in her body, listening to her quavering voice promising it'll be alright. _I'm alright. You're alright. We'll all be alright._ It's the first time Lance has heard her lie.

When the ambulence comes, both Booths jump in with him, their bodies tangling with wires and cords, as they grip his hand with all the strength and reassurance they can muster. Already, Brennan's eyes are ringed in red, and her husband's looking no different, but they smile at him, none-the-less, piping the holes in his heart with years of care and devotion and love,love, love,_ love_. Lance still won't meet those red-rings, doesn't wish to catch a glimspe of the darking around his friend's cheek, or the hatred in both their eyes when they realise there's no need to pity him anymore. Anger should be what he was met with, not this all-encompassing forgiveness, not this pillar of love that's anchored him down away from the swirling storm that's threatening the only life he knows.

'I'm sorry.' He breathes out, past the oxygen mask, past the doctors who are sticking him with needle after needle, past everything, and prays it reaches them. The shaky silence that answers is deafening to his ears, but he figures, at least they let him know that they don't want him. The is no falsities to be found here, not with Brennan and Booth, so when out of nowhere, his two favorite patients are embracing him, her lips pressing feather light kisses to his temple, his thumb soothing careful, tiny circles on the space on his neck just under his ear, the pressure on his chest disapears. 'No need.' Booth says. 'For what?' Brennan inquires. It's forgivement, at the very least, and Lance allows himself to be drawn into it, to seek comfort like a child. Somewhere above him, sirens stab at the cold winter air, flashing lights in the late night fog, and he lets the sound and their hands, like a lullaby, lull him into a state of calm. A smile crosses his lips, and he opens his mouth to say something, anything, but the universe is not done toying with him.

Pale white gloves extend into his line of sight, and suddenly, Brennan's and Booth's hands are gone. To tired to even lift his head, his eyes frantically search for them in the sea figures skirting past his vision, but they're not there. _They're not there._ With trembling arms, he tries to reach for something to grab hold of to try and stop the movement, yet when he looks down he finds himself restrained to the bed, leather bands tight against his wrists. 'Brennan? Booth? Hodgins? Anyone?' His thoughts echo around in his head, but the reality his is met with is far from ideal. Clean, surgical, ghouls pace the room in front of him, neither noticing him or his lucidness, but instead, hovering over the black, pulsing machines next to him, their gloved fingertips tracking beat after beat of that awful noise. It is a damning hell, one Lance is finding himself fearing more and more with each passing second. Then, suddenly, one of the specters notices him, and all eyes are suddenly trained in his direction. Slowly, it makes its way towards him, a pale white palm extended towards his arm. Shaking beneath his oxygen mask and scratchy hospital sheets, Lance parts his lips in a silent scream.

-  
It's another cliffie! YAY! That's right people. Dr. SecretAgentMan has brought you, yet again, another cliffhanger. I know all my loyal cupcakes probably hate me for this, but I love creating suspense. And come on my dearies. I know you wanna R&R. Please. _Please! _

Oh, and to the person who can correctly guess what really happened to Lancey in that last paragraph gets a special virtual cookie. (Not that these exist, but ya know. I'm sure you want one.)

And in case you didn't notice, this is no longer a three-shot. I've decided to expand this story cuz I love it oh so very much. (And the awesome fans who have stuck by this story.)


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